


Crossroads

by NightingalesAndHandGrenades (NightingalesAndLions)



Series: Queer as Easy [2]
Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: All of them will show up anyway, M/M, Modern AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2015-12-24
Packaged: 2018-05-08 19:44:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5510627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NightingalesAndLions/pseuds/NightingalesAndHandGrenades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joe is stuck. Most of his friends have found other halves, jobs and moved out of their family homes. Joe has done squat for that. An exciting opportunity and a new ownership turns this flagship to the right direction. Now just that other half thing and the rest is history.</p>
<p>Joe's comic book store "Crossroads" is open for business.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crossroads

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Gilove2dance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gilove2dance/gifts).



Joe Liebgott is well aware of his shortcomings as a person. It’s nothing new to him. since he is not the only child in his family and his parents have told him more than once that his social skills are not always the best. He knows all about it, he just doesn’t care. If people have any problems, they can either say it to his face or scramble off back to the hole they crawled out of for all Joe cares. So when his parents talk about things like manners, Joe just shrugs and leaves the room as soon as it is possible. 

He finishes high school and doesn’t even consider higher education. It’s one of those things Joe cannot imagine himself doing. He takes shifts in the local barber’s shop and spends most of his free time sipping beers in the local comic book store. It’s his favourite place and he gets on well with the elderly owner who doesn’t mind Joe helping out every now and then. Life is more or less perfect. Liebgott is aware that he might need to find a permanent job and move out of his parents place to give everyone some breathing room, but he just cannot figure out what he wants to do most. and college is simply not meant for him.

If Joe is honest with himself and his friends, he is a bit scared. Life doesn’t seem like a fun place to be so the comic book store becomes his shelter and hideout. 

When he finally can actually go to a bar and have a drink, Joe obviously goes for the bar, no, it's more of a club these days, after all the renovations. And it's a place that belongs to Lew Nixon’s dad – the most flamboyant place in town. Nixon is taking over as soon as he turns twenty one and, Liebgott thinks, that place suits him just fine. Lewis Nixon might be a fancy pants university student but he can outdrink most of them and is never shy about his opinion. Or preferences. Or both.

Joe has wanted to go for ages and has been actually sneaking in every now and then, avoiding the scary looking bouncers and using staff entrances and back alleys. What are friends for, right? Especially this group of friends who seem to study hard and party harder since sleep is for the weak, obviously. 

Most of Joe’s friends are in college and he might even consider it every now and then but when the exam season hits and he has to be the emergency coffee supplier (“Skinny, why the hell do you work in a coffee shop if you can’t get them coffee? You have no goddamn common sense!”) and sometimes has to take his over-worked friends out for a pizza with the bunch of guys who have turned in the books for tool chests and practical work, helping their families or just getting out of the family environment to… do just that.

Another great thing about having a big group of friends from all alleys of life? They don’t judge Joe’s life choices and he knows that they have his back just as he has theirs (probably one at a time, though).

And then the owner of the comic book store stars talking about leaving town. He isn’t getting any younger and he wants to move closer to his friends and family somewhere right across the country. Joe doesn’t pay much attention to what he says but when it happens, it takes Joe by surprise. It’s suddenly like the store is going to grow legs and crawl away. He makes a snap kind of spur of a moment decision while talking to the owner who is packing the comic books in boxes.

Two days later Joe Liebgott is a proud owner (well, not just him, let’s be honest, they pooled resources) of a comic book store.

Perhaps this is just the push towards a career and life choices Joe needs and you know what they say about gifted horses and teeth. He’s going to take it and enjoy himself.


End file.
